Brief Encounter
by ElviraGulch
Summary: One-off. Harry can't sleep and finds himself drawn to a Muggle cinema. Things quickly escalate when he encounters a familiar blond. Very fluffy HP/DM. Mostly pre-slash, a lot of pointless arguing.


**AN: I'm having some writer's block about Photo Booth, and then I spent the weekend watching Brief Encounter, fell in love all over again, and ended up writing this little romp in response. It's really not intended to be anything mind-blowing, it's probably a little bit OOC, and if you don't care about old movies you might find it kind of tedious. But, it amused me and I hope you like it too.**

After the fifth night in a row in which Harry found himself wandering around Camden at one in the morning, avoiding drunken club-goers and pausing in front of every bus stop ad trying to decipher meaning from the smiling faces in the adverts, Harry had to admit that maybe he was developing insomnia. Just a bit.

In the six years since the war, Harry'd been through several stretches of insomnia, each particular in its duration and expression. The first bout was, predictably, the result of nightmares—he'd wake up sweaty and shouting each night and wouldn't be able to fall back asleep. That round of insomnia had mostly involved a lot of tossing and turning, punching his pillow and trying to will himself into slumber. Eventually, the nightmares had subsided, and he'd congratulated himself on becoming well-adjusted and normal. But then, months later, he'd relapsed into sleeplessness. This second bout of insomnia was gentler, but also more insidious than the first. He'd lie in his bed, staring at the ceiling, and just wouldn't be able to fall asleep. Eventually, he'd given up trying, and he'd wander around his flat looking for things to fix. After a couple of months, he'd given himself a crash course in carpentry and earned a reputation amongst his friends as the go-to handy man. And after several months of not trying, he'd spontaneously started sleeping again—nothing to worry about.

The third bout of insomnia had been more lethargic. He'd given in to sleeplessness with a kind of resignation, and tried to find something more sedate than hanging wallpaper and replacing pipes to keep himself occupied. This was how Harry had acquired a penchant for _Witch Weekly_—for some reason the syrupy prose and gossipy articles were the only thing that could amuse him—and, from reading that, he eventually started keeping up with wizard soaps on the wireless. He'd gotten fairly obsessed with the personal lives of Lionel Gilderbread and his leading lady Beryl Yidris, and their fictional counterparts, Victor Viscleft and Patience Perspicket, by the time this round of insomnia faded and he could sleep through the night again.

The fourth bout was more studious in nature—he'd read all night, and in the space of three months had polished off half a library of novels, plays, poetry, memoirs, biographies. Anything he could get his hands on seemed fair game. He'd mostly gravitated towards Muggle books, but he'd also tried the corpus of Wizarding classics, making it through the entire _Modred the Marauding Merman _series in less than a week. Ron had been particularly pleased at this, and had even loaned Harry his childhood volumes of _Yarnuckle and Brandywine's Tales of Time Travel_.

This current bout was the most energetic yet. Every night, Harry would climb into his bed, only to feel his legs jittering underneath him. After a few minutes, he'd find himself dressing again, casting a Warming Charm against the cold, and walking briskly through the London streets. It wasn't so bad, as far as insomnia went. He rather enjoyed the solitude of deserted streets, and he'd learned more about the geography of the city in the past five days than he had in six years living there. It made him feel less lonely, somehow, even though he had spent quite a lot of time alone lately—Hermione and Ron had recently moved to the north for Hermione's work, and Ginny had taken a job in America as a representative of the Ministry in the embassy in Los Angeles just last year. Neville was at Hogwarts, of course, teaching most of the year, and George was so busy at the shop Harry hardly ever saw him. It seemed like everyone was moving on, and Harry was still stuck in the same place. Walking carried him forward, if only temporarily.

If he'd asked himself as he set out what exactly he was looking for, Harry wouldn't have been able to say. But, as he rounded a corner in a vaguely unfamiliar part of town, he suddenly saw a bright marquee lighting up the night—it was a cinema. The sign was for some arty Muggle film he vaguely recalled seeing an article or two about in the paper, but what drew him forward was an old-fashioned movie poster in the window of the ticket booth with the word WITCH in bright red letters across the middle. He crossed the street and stood in front of the poster. The film was 'I Married a Witch', starring Veronica Lake and Fredric March. Harry had never heard of the film, or of Fredric March, but he knew Veronica Lake from film noir—seductive and mysterious, she was always disappearing out of nightclubs or dropping cryptic clues from behind her icy blond waterfall of hair.

This didn't look like that sort of film at all. It looked like a comedy—or at least a romance. "No man can resist her!" the top of the poster exclaimed, "…and I'm not complaining, would you?" it read below. Harry smiled. The movie had just started only a few minutes before, he noted, and before he knew what he was doing, he'd paid the ancient crone behind the ticket counter and was walking into the darkened theatre, trying very hard not to make too much noise as he found his seat.

He didn't know how much he'd missed from the beginning of the film, but it wasn't hard to catch up. Veronica Lake was some sort of vaporous witch whose love potion had gone awry, enchanting her to fall in love with a Muggle man, instead of the other way around. Her father, a drunk and rather vindictive wizard, provided comic relief and an obstacle to his daughter's intended wooing. Harry surveyed the other theatre-goers—a sparse crowd, just one young couple who were engaged in some silent but rather furtive mutual enjoyment towards the back, a two older gentlemen who, had they been sitting together, might have reminded Harry of Statler and Waldorf, and, just ahead of where he sat, a young man with blond hair. Harry couldn't see much about the blond, except that his face was tilted up at the screen in what Harry imagined was rapt attention.

Harry fell into the rhythm of the film, and soon found himself laughing at some pratfall that, ordinarily, wouldn't have seemed that funny at all. His laughter echoed around the theatre, causing the blond man to turn back and look at him. Whether his face was disapproving or merely curious, Harry couldn't say—the light of the screen behind him cast his face into shadow, and Harry saw no distinguishing features. After a moment, the man turned away, and Harry forgot all about him, lost in Veronica Lake's golden tresses and impish smiles.

The film ended and Harry rose to leave—the couple, as well as the blond man, had exited sometime during the film, it seemed, so that only Harry and the old men remained behind. Harry strolled into the lobby and past the ticket woman, who was reading a Muggle soap digest with a supremely bored expression on her face.

"Excuse me," Harry said, politely.

"Yes, dearie?" She looked up at him expectantly.

"I was just wondering—do you show old films like this every evening?"

"Every weekday we do. There's a program if you like." She indicated a garishly colored pink flyer that looked to have been hastily made on a xerox machine. It had that heavy, fuzzy look of something that had been copied from a copy one too many times. Harry checked his watch for the date and then looked on the flyer. Tomorrow night they were playing _Brief Encounter_, and he perked up.

"Thanks so much! You're a gem!" he said, grinning, and, not waiting for a reply, started to walk briskly in the direction, he hoped, of his flat.

It just so happened that _Brief Encounter _was one of Harry's favorite films. He'd never admit it, probably, to someone like Ron (although, now that he thought about it, he didn't know that Ron had ever seen a Muggle movie), but he had a rather large soft spot for old films. He was particularly partial to films of the 30s and 40s, but he liked 50s and 60s films as well. He'd grown to love them as a child, when his Aunt Petunia used to drag him to an old theatre in Little Whinging that ran Sunday matinees of film classics. Petunia loved watching glamorous stars make love in melodramas, but could never convince either Vernon or Dudley to accompany her. Harry, always pliant, became her excuse—she'd claim that Harry was getting in ickle Dudders way, or that Vernon needed to work from home without being disturbed, and she and Harry would spend an afternoon at the pictures. At first, Harry had resented being used as an excuse, but soon he'd come to relish the outings. In the theatre, everything was still and lovely—no one scolded him, or made him feel bad about his parents, or bullied him.

And Petunia was kinder at the theatre as well. Without Dudley around, she'd sometimes deign to buy Harry an ice cream or popcorn. Very occasionally, when the theatre was dark and the scene playing on the screen particularly moving, she'd sometimes reach over to hold Harry's hand—whether for his comfort or her own, he could never be sure. _Brief Encounter_, with its sweeping yet middle-class romance and heart-wrenching piano concerto soundtrack, had never failed to elicit this response. Now, when Harry thought of the film, what he felt was a warm, soft hand in his—one of the only moments of human connection in his otherwise solitary childhood. As an adult, he'd amassed quite a collection of films for himself, and though he watched them often, he missed going to the cinema to see them on the big screen. He couldn't believe his good luck in finding a place that showed films like this at night.

The theatre was a little more full the next evening. The young couple was gone, but there were several older women, some of whom had brought knitting and one who had brought a wicker basket full of what appeared to be homemade Banbury buns, if the delicious odor wafting from across the room was any indication. A small group of young kids, about university age, were gathered near the front, excitedly chattering to each other as they arranged and rearranged themselves along the row, using some sort of mathematics known only to nineteen year olds to calculate their group dynamic. The two older gentlemen were back, as was the blond man, who had taken a seat in along the extreme right of the theatre, right next to the wall as though shrinking away from the boisterous youths and the knitting housewives. Harry leaned forward to see if he could catch a glimpse of the man's face, but all he could tell was that he looked to be about the same age as Harry himself. All else was shadows.

The film began with almost no preamble—the lights went down suddenly and a few seconds later, Rachmaninoff roared to life and puffs of silvery smoke signaled the familiar opening of the film. Harry soon felt himself being swept along in the romance of the small town train station. He'd seen the film so many times he could almost chant the lines alongside the actors, yet each moment of Celia Johnson's tremulous face and each narrative twist pulled at his heart as though for the first time.

_Cold?_

_No, not really?_

_Happy?_

_No. Not really._

_I know exactly what you're going to say. That it isn't worth it. That the furtiveness, the lying, outweigh the happiness we might have together. Isn't that it?_

_Something like that._

_I want to ask you something. Just to reassure myself._

_What is it?_

_It is true for you, isn't it? This overwhelming feeling that we have for each other? It's as true for you as it is more me, isn't it?_

_Yes, it's true._

As the two lovers bent forwards to share one of the film's very few kisses, Harry became aware that someone had moved and was sitting beside him. He tried to turn his head without being too obvious and realized it was the blond man who'd been at the theatre the night before and had been sitting against the wall when the film had begun. It was a little difficult to see in the dark, but Harry noticed that the man was not wearing a coat or a jacket, but instead had a three-quarter cloak around his shoulders, and his shoes, unless Harry was much mistaken, appeared to be made of dragon hide. Was the blond man a wizard? Intrigued to the point of no longer caring if he appeared rude, Harry turned in his seat to face the man.

In any other circumstance, Harry might have shouted, so great was the shock of the familiar features he found in the face of the blond man. As it was, being in the middle of what he considered to be a film so beautifully romantic that it approached the sacred, he merely started back in his chair silently. Of all the faces he might have anticipated finding in a Muggle cinema in the heart of London in the middle of the night, Draco Malfoy's certainly did not rank. And yet—here he was.

The remainder of the film went by in a blur—he barely even registered Laura's tragic near-suicide as the express roared by, and when the final shot of the train station, obscured partially by letters spelling THE END, flashed upon the screen, he was surprised. The lights came up, but he couldn't make himself move. Malfoy made no motions to leave either. They sat, silent, while everyone else emptied the theatre. When they were finally alone, Malfoy turned to him suddenly, a look of supreme disdain on his face. Malfoy stood, tapped his foot rather impatiently, and then said, haughtily.

"Well, if you are coming you had better move quickly."

With that, he stalked off down the aisle toward the exit. Harry waiting only a beat before springing up behind him to follow. Draco never turned to see if Harry followed until three blocks later, when he slowed in front of an all-night diner. He held the door for Harry, then overtook him, dragging him into a booth near the back.

"Why are you following me?" Draco asked, shortly.

"I thought you wanted me to follow you."

"Not from the theatre. To the theatre. Why are you following me to my theatre?"

"I didn't know it was your theatre. I came to see _Brief Encounter_."

"Stop lying. You were there last night. I saw you. What were you doing?"

"I was watching the movie. I like movies."

"No one likes _I Married A Witch_. It's a terrible film."

"I rather enjoyed it."

Draco eyed him suspiciously.

"Potter, I do not know what your game is, but that cinema is my sanctuary. It is usually deserted, no one talks to me, and I can be _alone. _I do not know why, after six years, you have decided to resume stalking me, but I forbid you from entering that cinema ever again." Draco delivered this entire speech so imperiously that Harry felt himself growing hot with anger.

"Look, Malfoy. I happen to love old films, and I happen to love _Brief Encounter_ and I know that _Holiday _is playing tomorrow night and I love that film too and I will go to any damn cinema I damn well please and if you don't like it you can sod off!"

"I refuse to believe you have ever even seen _Holiday_, let alone love it."

"It's my second favorite Katherine Hepburn/Cary Grant film, you prat."

Draco raised his eyebrows, as though deeply scandalized.

"Since it is not humanly possible for you to rank _Holiday _above _Brining Up Baby_, I can only assume that means you prefer it to _The Philadelphia Story_—which only further proves that you are a classless wanker without culture or breeding." Draco narrowed his eyes, leaning forward, "I should have suspected as much in school—I bet you just love Hepburn's histrionic speeches about the nobility of the poor."

"Oh, come off it, Malfoy. _Philadelphia Story_ may be the more famous film, but do you honestly believe that Hepburn should just forgive her drunkard husband just because she got a bit tipsy herself? He practically ruins their lives and she just takes him back?"

"I suppose you'd have her run off with Jimmy Stewart like a common tart!"

"Just because he's a reporter and not some rich old-money git you think he's not worthy of her or something? You haven't changed at all, you absolute cock!"

As soon as the word was out of his mouth, Harry realized, quite suddenly, that both he and Draco were yelling, even screaming, at the top of their voices at each other and that everyone in the entire diner had fallen deathly silent. Not only that, but they had both leaned so far forward across the table that their faces were only a few inches apart. Harry blushed furiously—he hadn't yelled, really yelled, at someone since… well, probably since the last time he'd seen Draco Malfoy. He coughed apologetically and sat back in his seat. Draco, scowling, mimicked him, and both of them were silent for a moment.

In the pause, a waitress came over to take their orders. Draco peremptorily ordered two coffees and sent her off with a wave of his hand. He studied Harry for a moment, as though making a decision. Then, finally, he spoke.

"You say you love old films?"

"Yeah, I do," Harry said, warily.

"What's your favorite Preston Sturges comedy?"

"_The Lady Eve_," Harry answered, without a beat.

"Favorite MGM musical?"

"_On the Town._"

"Favorite western star?"

"Alan Ladd."

"Favorite noir?"

"_The Big Sleep_."

"Favorite Norma Shearer film?"

"_The Women._"

Draco snorted.

"Got a problem with that?"

"I'm baffled as to why you prefer what is probably the origin of the chick flick to the more carnal delights of _The Divorcee_, but considering you were tearing up through half of the melodramatic speeches in _Brief Encounter_, I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised."

Harry leaned forward towards Draco, but spoke quiety. "Draco Malfoy—you can insult me all you like—but you are not allowed to insult a single frame of _Brief Encounter_. It is one of the world's few perfect films."

The waitress returned with coffee and Harry leaned back to take the cup from her. Draco waited for her to walk away before he replied.

"Reluctantly, I do agree with you. It is a perfect film." Draco sipped his coffee experimentally. "Is it your favorite film?"

Harry considered for a moment.

"No, but it's close. I can only watch _Brief Encounter _every once and a while—it's like eating a liter of ice cream at one go, if you do it too often you get a little queasy. It's too rich to do everyday. My favorite film is _The Apartment._"

Draco said nothing, but continued to sip his coffee.

"Is this a one-way street, then? You just going to drill me on cinema and I don't get anything in return?"

"I am trying to decide if your professed love of old films is in fact genuine. Further, I'm trying to ascertain if you taste in films is as appallingly abysmal as the tattered excuse for clothing you apparently still insist on wearing."

"So you're not going to answer me?"

Draco closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the booth. Harry thought he might be ignoring him, but then he said, all in a rush:

"_Sullivan's Travels, Meet Me in St. Louis, _Clayton Moore_, Double Indemnity, Marie Antoinette_."

Harry snorted.

"My choices are better than yours," Draco sneered.

"I'm not laughing at your choices, Malfoy, but I swear you couldn't have picked a better princess to model yourself after than Marie Antoinette."

Draco drew himself up in his chair. "I'll have you know I sympathize greatly with the French aristocracy. No tragedy is closer to my heart than the French Revolution."

Harry laughed, unsure if Draco were really joking or not.

"Have you decided if I can come back tomorrow night then?" Harry asked.

Draco sniffed and pretended to examine something on the back of his hand.

"I suppose if you must. But be warned, Harry Potter, if you disturb the peace of my sanctuary I will have you removed."

Out of a sense of self-preservation, and perhaps some sympathy towards the other patrons of the diner, Harry refrained from making any comment.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Compared to the life I lead, the man in a chain gang thoroughly enjoys himself._

Harry hadn't been lying when he'd told Draco that he preferred _Holiday_ to _The Philadelphia Story_. He fully recognized the preference was controversial—but he had always harbored a secret distaste for Katherine Hepburn, perhaps carried over from his aunt Petunia who found her to be 'un-romantic', and only really enjoyed her when she played more comedic roles. _Bringing Up Baby_ was the best, of course, just as Draco had guessed, but _Holiday _would do in a pinch, and then mostly because it heavily featured Cary Grant, who, in the mad-cap world of _Holiday_ performed back-flips and was rather good to look at.

Despite Harry's long-held antipathy towards Hepburn, he found himself oddly sympathetic to her character the next night, seated next to Draco Malfoy in the little cinema somewhere near Camden. Her delicate, pointed features, which he used to find chilling, seemed instead to be charming. Her petulant rejection of her pampered upbringing no longer seemed like whinging. He saw her in an entirely new light—finally a perfect match for the odd-ball Grant, whose shabby suits and out-of-place jokes put him at odds with the snobby aristocrats Hepburn was so desperate to escape.

When the film ended, he again found himself following Draco to the diner, where Draco again imperiously ordered coffee for them both and then launched into a series of berating questions about Harry's taste in films—his favorite directors, his least favorite actors, his most loathed critical darlings. Every answer Harry gave set in motion a rising tide of heated debate, until again Harry found himself fairly shouting at Draco above the din of the crowded diner.

"Julie Andrews wasn't even in the film version of _Camelot_! Her part is played by Vanessa Redgrave!" Harry slammed his hand on the table at the last part.

"Well, Julie Andrews is an old bint, and I'm certainly not choosing _The Sound of Music._ Although I can see why you would be unnaturally attached to a bunch of shrieking orphans wearing tablecloths and traipsing about in the woods while a _war is on_."

"Come off it, Malfoy. They aren't orphans, only their mother is dead, and their lederhosen are made from drapes, not tablecloths."

"I hardly see how any of this is improving your case."

"I don't have a case."

"My point exactly."

"You have to chose a film that Julie Andrews is actually in."

"Fine. I choose _Mary Poppins_."

"Seriously?"

"I very much enjoy the musical number about banking. If you ignore the bits about hanging about with chimney sweeps, I think you'll find that Mary Poppins herself is a fine disciplinarian with zero tolerance for the frippery misadventures of delusional children."

"You live in a strange world."

"Any time you'd like to stop intruding into it is fine by me."

There was an awkward pause, during which Harry felt he should have had some quip or insult to offer, but instead he sipped his coffee and tried not to meet Draco's eyes. The waitress, taking advantage, Harry supposed, of the ensuing silence, came by their table and pointedly laid down the check. She gave Harry a reproachful look as she passed and he blushed, realizing they'd been in a shouting match for the past two hours. It was now obscenely late, but Harry felt agitated and on-edge, like he could run a mile if he took a mind to.

"What's on tomorrow?" he asked.

"_Roberta_."

"I've never seen it."

"It's an Astaire/Rogers."

"Oh."

"They aren't the primary couple though. Irene Dunn and Randolph Scott are."

"Isn't Randolph Scott the one who was rumored to be gay with Cary Grant?"

Draco regarded him cooly. "I wouldn't know."

"I, er… I love Irene Dunn."

"You would."

Harry rolled his eyes. "I don't even know what that means."

"It means I am out of barbs this evening and it is time to call it a night."

Draco stood to leave, taking a few coins out of his pocket and leaving them with the bill. Harry noted they were all Muggle currency.

"Draco?"

"Yes, Harry?"

"See you tomorrow night."

Draco gave the briefest of smiles.

"Tomorrow night."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Roberta_ turned out to be a controversial enough film that they had barely exited the little theatre before an argument burst out between them, startling the few straggling filmgoers sleepily preceding them out into the street.

"The only worthwhile character in that entirely farcical film is Ladislaw."

"The deposed Russian prince? Ugh, how predictable, Malfoy."

"I suppose you sympathized with Kent—finally, a relatable character for Harry Potter, an aging jock past his prime and relevance, clinging to antiquated morality and old girlfriends, with the fashion sense of Dolores Umbridge."

"I am not clinging to old girlfriends!"

"Touchy, touchy."

"I can't believe you didn't like the film."

"I can't believe you did."

"The dance numbers were excellent."

"The dance numbers were adequate. Certainly they were nothing compared to the roller skating sequence in _Shall We Dance?_"

"I've never like that dance—it's too gimmicky."

"Musicals are gimmicky."

"I thought the dance to 'Smoke Gets in Your Eyes' was the best of the film—no gimmicks, no singing—it was lovely."

Draco rolled his eyes.

"I should have guessed you'd be the biggest Hufflepuff on the planet when it came to films. If you had your way the whole of cinema would just be pretty faces gazing adoringly at one another and saying nothing."

Harry didn't have a chance to reply, as they'd reached the diner. They chose the same booth they'd sat in the past two nights, Draco ordered their coffee, and they stared at each other for a few minutes in silence. Eventually, Draco began his questions.

"Favorite last line of a film?"

"Louie, this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

"How predictable and how horrible of you."

"Can you think of a better one?"

"I can think of several. In any case you have to admit that any warm sentiments that one could possibly feel for that line are ruined by its being spoken to _a serial rapist_."

"That's a bit much."

"Is it? Louie spends the majority of the film coercing unwilling women into his bed with the promise of documents to help them flee the country. Last time I checked, threatening someone's life or livelihood in order to make them sleep with you was a form of sexual assault."

"I thought you liked morally ambiguous characters."

"And I thought your noble Gryffindor heart prevented you from sympathizing with opportunistic rapists."

The waitress returned with their coffee, setting it down with the most sour expression Harry had ever seen on the face of a food service worker. She looked at Malfoy with pure loathing, and when Harry smiled and thanked her for the coffee, she rolled her eyes in disdain.

"I don't think the waitress likes us very much."

"Oh, how sad. There is a single person on the planet who isn't falling all over themselves for the great Harry Potter," Draco said, voice dripping with sarcasm. "Forgive me if I forgo shedding a single tear on your behalf, but I've used up all of mine in the course of being one of the single most despised persons in all of wizard society."

"I don't think you are despised that much these days," Harry said, "I think most people have kind of forgotten about you."

"Oh, well that makes me feel loads better. Thank you, Potter, for your compassion."

Harry shrugged.

"What's your favorite last line, if not from _Casablanca_?"

"What makes you think I'd tell you that?"

"The fact that we've been discussing nothing but our film preferences for the past three nights?"

"Yes, well, some things are personal." Draco sipped his coffee, scowling.

Draco recovered quickly, and soon was back to peppering Harry with questions and then ridiculing his answers. Harry didn't seem to feel the time passing at all, so he was surprised when, during a discussion of whether Ann Miller or Cyd Charisse was a better dancer, he looked out the window and realized the sun was rising. They'd talked through the night. He opened his mouth to mention the fact to Draco, but was interrupted by the sudden, and angry, reappearance of their waitress.

"Look, you tossers—my shift was supposed to end two hours ago, but I've been stuck here waiting for you two to settle up and I'm fed up with it. Get out! You sit here for hours, you order nothing but coffee, you scare away half the customers yelling at each other about bollocks knows what, and you're no longer welcome here!"

"Look here—" Draco began, but the waitress cut him off immediately.

"I don't want to hear it. You're banned. Get out." She pointed towards the door. Draco's mouth worked open and closed, but no sound came out. Harry slid out of the booth, grabbing Draco by his shirt.

"Come on, let's just get out of here."

Draco spluttered some half-formed protests, but allowed himself to be pulled out of the diner. They walked a few blocks in relative silence before Harry realized he was still holding onto Draco's sleeve. He stopped and let go, blushing slightly.

"I don't know where we're going," Harry said.

"Who says I'm going anywhere with you?" Draco sneered.

"Alright, I'll see you tomorrow night?" Harry tentatively asked.

"You mean tonight—it's morning."

"I noticed."

"There isn't a film tonight. It's Saturday. They'll be showing some godawful art film. With subtitles."

Harry shuffled his feet. He should have been more tired, but he felt wired, energized, and he wasn't sure what to do with all that energy.

"I, er… I don't want to go to sleep," Harry said, finally. "So what comes next?"

Draco regarded him cooly for a moment.

"I can think of at least one answer to that question."

Harry raised his eyebrows. Then, in a sudden flourish of movement, Draco moved toward him. He didn't have a chance to move away, and he felt himself being dragged into the alley, and then pressed up against the wall of a building. His back hit the bricks with force, and he felt as though he'd been hit by a dozen stunners. Draco's face was close to his, breath heavy and fast. _He's going to kiss me, _he thought, and almost as soon as he thought it, it was happening. For the first ten seconds of the kiss, it was extremely awkward, but then Harry felt himself relax. Draco's mouth was warm, his tongue surprisingly soft and agile, and the kiss was quickly becoming one of the best Harry had ever experienced. When Draco pulled away, Harry felt breathless and dazed.

"Your place or mine?" Harry asked quietly.

"Which is closer?"

"I don't know where you live," Harry said, "frankly right now I don't know where I live."

"Fine, we'll go to mine." Draco released his shirt and began to quickly walk away, without waiting for Harry to follow. Harry hurried to catch up, trying to match Draco's swift strides.

"Draco, wait!"

"I will not wait. You will walk faster."

"No, I just wanted to know…" Harry pulled level with Draco. He had no idea where they were headed or what he was doing or why. "I wanted to know what your favorite last line is. You never said."

Draco mumbled something half under his breath, but Harry only caught the first bit of it.

"Did you just tell me to shut up?"

"No, you prat," Draco stopped suddenly and turned towards Harry, his eyes burning intensely. "That's my favorite last line: 'Shut up and deal!'"


End file.
